Venomous Secrets

by Anne Renwick

  Despite her claim of a Turkish name, the woman’s English was flawless. No doubt a moniker carefully selected for her role, part and parcel of a pretense supporting the illusion they had stepped into a building erected upon the far-flung eastern lands of the Ottoman Empire.

  Skirts swirling, the woman turned and floated down a hallway.

  “It seems proof must wait,” Cait whispered. “You’ll simply have to find a way to trust me.” A bit too eagerly, she moved to follow Ceyda.

  “Blind faith won’t work.” Jack caught his wife’s arm and locked eyes. “If needles or vials filled with unidentified substances are involved in this treatment,” he hissed, “you are not to test them.”

  “I would never.” The blaze from her eyes suggested she might kick her husband in the shins. “Did you learn nothing about proper experimental protocol?” Shoulders stiff and square, she followed Ceyda down a hallway, muttering about the lack of mandatory laboratory hours for medical students.

  Why worry about a pituitary adenoma when his wife might bring about his demise long before Thornton could attempt surgery?

  Chapter Twelve

  Yet more colorful tiles adorned the walls and arches of the private room into which they were ushered. At its center was a large stone slab draped with toweling, a table of sorts wide enough for two. There was a sink. Shelving holding additional towels. A glass-fronted cabinet containing an array of oil-filled glass bottles.

  But no medical implements or machinery of any kind.

  Nothing suspicious leapt out at him.

  “Robes, towels, nudity. All are acceptable,” Ceyda informed them, waving toward a privacy screen standing in the corner. Beside it, a pair of dressing robes hung from hooks. “The choice is yours.”

  “For?” Cait inquired.

  “Your massages, of course.”

  Was that all? Impatience reared its ugly head. The duchess and her instincts. So far this trip north was nothing more than time wasted when they ought to be monitoring the gaslit streets of London.

  But the sooner this was over, the sooner they could return to the privacy of their own rooms. There, he prayed, his wife’s jaw-dropping revelation would prove to be fact. Only then could he give in to the desperate need that clawed at him and drag his wife to the marital bed.

  Irritated, he lifted an eyebrow and waved her toward the screen. “Ladies first.”

  “I think not.” Arms crossed, she slitted her eyes.

  Across the room, Ceyda selected a bottle of oil from the shelf.

  “This won’t work,” he murmured, “if you don’t at least pretend to cooperate. Set our disagreement aside.”

  “Fine.” Cait didn’t budge. “You first.”

  “Very well.” Tempted as he was to strip bare without prelude and dare her to do the same, there was the matter of his concealed TTX pistol. He stepped behind the screen and divested himself of wet clothing in exchange for a dry linen towel. With much reluctance, he placed his weapon upon the floor.

  Stretching out upon the bench, he forced his mind to their assigned task. This “treatment” had, at the very least, led them through a warren of rooms deep into the inner sanctum of the spa. If there were secrets to be uncovered, they would find them here. Behind locked doors.

  They’d return later. After midnight, lock picks in hand.

  Warm oil and soft hands moved across his shoulders. “So tense,” Ceyda commented.

  “Cait?” He patted the space beside him, wondering at her sudden prudery. “It’s just a massage.”

  She eyed the woman, uncertain.

  “Arrangements were for you both,” Ceyda purred, moving hands slick with jasmine-scented oil across his back. “But if you would prefer not to remain and participate, I can return your husband to you when he’s more… relaxed.”

  “No. I’ll stay.”

  Was that a note of possessiveness in her voice? Jealousy? A primitive part of his brain rejoiced. Regardless, it motivated her into action.

  He dropped his head onto his arm, watching, as his wife’s shadow shifted behind the screen. He imagined her studying his weapon, envious. The moment they returned to London, she would demand one of her own.

  “When will we meet with the doctor?” he asked.

  The duchess herself would be spreading the news of their marriage as swiftly as possible. His mother would be livid. And, should any connection to the venomous woman exist, his brother would fume until he belched coal dust.

  Would Aubrey linger in London? Rush north to forestall their investigation? Or would he merely laugh, gleeful while his younger brother’s scandal was discussed and dissected by sharp ton tongues?

  “Perhaps tomorrow or the day after. Though I ask myself,” Ceyda’s voice was a low hum as her fingers dug into his shoulders, “why does a man of such strength and obvious virility have need of such a consultation? Are you first-born, keen to extend the family line?”

  Second. Though there were certain family expectations.

  Keen? To bed his wife? Most certainly.

  But children? That rather put the cart before the horse.

  However, if Cait was indeed injecting herself with all manner of toxins, such was another topic to discuss. What passed through a mother’s bloodstream passed into her unborn child’s.

  “Or perhaps you’re concerned about your wife’s ability to conceive?” Ceyda crooned as her hands gripped his biceps, her mouth strangely close to his ear. “No worries. That can be addressed, though you’ll have to decide if another’s life is worth the price of the one you would create.”

  Unease crept into his stomach. “What do you mean by—”

  Pain stabbed into the muscle of his shoulder. Two sharp pinpricks. Followed by a sudden rush of warmth.

  Shit. Fuck. Damn.

  He’d been bitten.

  Another venomous woman existed?

  With no medical equipment in view, he’d stupidly thought them safe.

  “Cait!” he cried, rolling. Pushing at Ceyda, he tried to sit up and found his muscles unwilling to cooperate.

  “It’s best if you remain upon the table.” Her voice was firm, her hand pressing forcibly down upon his chest. “The initial effects spike within the first twenty minutes. Hold still. Don’t fight it.”

  His mind leapt to the neutered existence of one unfortunate London publican. Not a chance. Focused upon each other, they’d walked right into the den of a viper. Stupid. Stupid. Stupid.

  A buzzing swept through his veins as he managed to throw the woman’s hand away. His bare feet hit cool tile, and he staggered, reaching out to steady himself upon the wall.

  “Don’t move!” Cait barked. “Not another step!” The TTX pistol was in her hands and pointed at the venomous masseuse.

  Never before had he ever beheld such a sexy, glorious sight. A woman stepping into the fray on his behalf. Her dark eyes flashed. Full lips compressed into a firm line. Midnight hair tumbled, wild and free, over bare shoulders and arms and a most delightful chest.

  A stupid grin stretched across his face. She’d opted for the towel, wrapping it tight across the wonders of her generous bosom. A simple tug and he could drop the bothersome linen to the ground to satisfy his sudden and desperate need to see both taut peaks of her glorious breasts at once. To catch them with his lips, each in turn. To nibble and pull and suck until she cried for mercy.

  Jack took a step toward her, but the floor dipped and swayed. He caught at the cabinet. Blinked at the flecks of light spun out by the brass lamp overhead. He could see spirals of jasmine twist upon air currents. The linen cloth at his waist shifted, slid lower on his hips. Grazed against rampant, straining need.

  Everything felt so very right and, at the same time, very, very wrong.

  “How dare you bring a weapon into this sanctuary!” Ceyda threw her hands in the air. “I’ve done nothing wrong. You paid for this.”

  “Paid for what, exactly?” Cait’s demand pounded against his ear drums.

  “For t
he drug.” The masseuse flashed a reassuring smile, one edged with a glint of gold.

  Cait glanced in his direction. Her words rose on a crescendo. “Did she bite you?”

  He slapped a hand to his neck, surprised. “She did.” Aether, how had he already forgotten? “It’s nothing.” Nothing mattered, save convincing Cait to put her hands on him. All of him. Anywhere and everywhere. He let the corner of his mouth curl up. “But perhaps you’d best check.”

  Relax, he said. It’s just a massage, he said. What could possibly go wrong?

  Great aether, Ceyda had bitten her husband. Her partner. Bitten!

  But this was not the dark-haired woman who had attacked her, launching from the shadowy corner of a hired crank hack. Not only was her hair a light brown but her face betrayed no sign of recognizing Cait.

  Two such women existed? One in a spa, the other ravaging the streets of London. Were there more like her?

  With great effort, Cait relaxed her grip on the pistol, dragged in a deep breath, and reminded herself that people paid for this so-called treatment. Paid to be bitten, to be drugged. While the woman in London was vicious and bloodthirsty and deadly, this one might well be reasonable. Killing one’s clientele, after all, did not ensure repeat business.

  Jack would be fine.

  She was counting on it.

  Ever so slightly, she lowered the pistol.

  What, then, stood before her, garbed in the trappings of the Ottoman Empire?

  Fascinated, Cait tipped her head, studying the woman’s facial features. Completely human. All female. Save for a slight bulge at the corners of her jaw. It could be nothing. Or it could be everything.

  “You call it a drug, yet you bit my husband. This is not a standard medical technique.”

  “It is not.” Ceyda’s hands dropped, twisted about each other before her chest. “I was hired to provide a unique experience. Aren’t you curious? Come. Join him.” The woman’s movements grew sinuous and weaving as she crept closer to Cait. “A little nip is all it takes. With a little help, all inhibition melts away.” She crooked a finger. “Look at your husband. How ready he is for you.”

  “It’s the venom.” Casting her mind back to the London attack, she could recall nothing but pain and panic and a rising awareness that she might not survive. She took a step back.

  “Not all of it,” Jack all but hummed the lust-filled words. “You’re beautiful. And I’m rather enamored of how steadily you’re holding my weapon. Though I can think of other things I’d rather have those fingers wrapped around right now.”

  A rather forward comment from a man who couldn’t manage the slightest buss of a kiss in a London pub without embarrassment, who refused to bed his wife the night of their marriage on moral grounds.

  A quick glance away from the venomous creature informed Cait that a rather prominent portion of Jack’s anatomy did indeed desire attention.

  “If it’s the worry of bearing children,” the woman hummed, reaching out for Cait, “a tiny nip is all it takes to make your worries melt away.”

  Doubtful. She suspected she would be immune. Though testing that hypothesis at this very moment would be unwise. One agent with a clouded mind was problem enough.

  They—she—needed to capture this woman, tie her up, transport her back to London for questioning and study. So much for visiting the floating cabinet of curiosities. Two darts would render Ceyda dead weight. A massive inconvenience with Jack not in his right mind and no idea how long the venom’s effects might last or, aether forbid, what side-effects might develop.

  Somehow, she would have to manage. She needed clothing. A steam carriage or a private dirigible. A servant amenable to heavy-handed bribery.

  “In small doses, it’s an aphrodisiac?” Cait struggled to buy time as her mind raced.

  A drug delivered by a venomous beauty in the private luxury of an exclusive spa, one promising to unleash erotic fantasies. Yes, she could see how many would be tempted to sample its effects. How many, she wondered, later regretted their words and actions?

  “For men. But for women, it’s a different blessing.” The woman smiled, and a flash of gold gleamed along the edge of her canine teeth.

  An implant?

  Cait felt her jaw slacken. Dammit. The woman was nothing more than a laboratory-created siren. A bewitching plaything for the wealthy whose entire purpose was to function as a human hypodermic syringe.

  So much for discovering a new sub-species. Or even an interesting human variant. Disappointment splashed over her, cold and wet, followed by a touch of shame. Was that not what she was herself, human with a streak of something more? Hiding in plain sight while she worked to unlock the secrets of her unusual biology, levering her discoveries to her own advantage?

  Yet there was a key difference. Cait strove to preserve human life, not to destroy it.

  The London murders must be stopped, any murderous venomous beauties locked away where their mouths could be pried open and studied, the venom and implant analyzed.

  Therein lay the novelty. How had some mad scientist accomplished this feat? Surgical procedure aside, a clue to the origins of the venom lay tucked within her reticule. While dressing this morning, she’d peeked at the biogel plates and stood open-mouthed in wonder.

  This venom shared biological properties with that of Naja naja, the spectacled cobra. Many venoms would, given the large number of species within the genus. Yet, to her knowledge, no cobra’s bite had ever demonstrated aphrodisiac effects. Then again, most snakes struck to disable their prey, not to lull them into the stupid stupor now exhibited by her husband.

  If the women weren’t truly venomous, but instead reliant upon an implant, that meant that there was at least a new species of snake to locate, to identify, to study. Project potential. That brightened her mood.

  “What happens at higher doses?” Cait suspected Jack’s mind would be addled for hours yet. “Say, if you were to bite your victim and hold tight?”

  Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Jack take a step, trip over his own feet and drop onto the stone table. Hard.

  “Much as I want you alone and all to myself.” He spoke slowly and with effort. “There’s a nagging voice in the fog of my mind that insists you shoot her. Just a dart or two. Hold back on the third. Explaining a dead body to the hotel staff is an inconvenience we can do without.”

  “Enough.” Ceyda’s eyes grew cold. “It’s clear you’ve entered my sanctuary with ill intent and under false pretenses.” She took a step backward, reaching blindly for the door handle behind her. “I want you both to leave. Now.”

  A harsh reminder of the immediate need to subdue and capture this woman, without Jack’s assistance and endure the complications that would follow.

  “Agreed. Alas, you will be accompanying us.” Cait squeezed the trigger and—Snap! Whoosh!—the TTX pistol discharged its dart on a hiss of compressed air.

  Ceyda fell against the door, sagged and slid to the ground, mouth agape. “You shot me!”

  “So I did. I’ve questions, but they’ll need to wait a few minutes.” With the masseuse temporarily disabled, she rushed to Jack’s side, frowning. “Symptoms? Tell me what’s wrong.”

  “Not a thing.” He grinned, slipped a hand up the length of her bare arm. “Everything is perfect. Especially you.”

  She swatted his hand away and pressed her own to his chest. Beneath her palm she could feel his heart skipping and leaping. All while his lungs worked to drag in great gulps of air. “Cogs. Your cardiovascular system is being put through its paces. Too fast and hard.”

  “Hard is the word for it.” In a heartbeat, his arms wrapped about her waist and flipped her onto the table beneath him.

  Warm, solid muscle rippled and shifted, pinning her in place. All of it worthy of careful exploration. If only circumstances were different.

  “Jack.” She kept her voice calm and measured, not a hard task when they had an immobilized audience of one sagged against a nearby wall. “St
op. We have a task to complete.”

  But her reasoning fell on deaf ears.

  “I need you badly.” He nibbled at her earlobe, nuzzled at her throat. “I’ve never been so aroused, so desperate for a woman.”

  “Jack! Not here. Not now.” She shoved at his shoulders. “Stop it. We’ll lose our positions if you can’t focus.”

  “Oh, I’m very focused.” He shifted, tugged at the towel wrapped about her with his teeth. “But if it’s the position to which you object…” He rolled, and she found herself atop him, straddling his arousal.

  Gears and pins, he felt good.

  She stifled a groan.

  Drug-addled, she reminded herself. Not alone. And, eventually, people would come looking for Ceyda.

  One must do what one must. “This is not the place and not the time for bedding your new wife.”

  He thrust against her. “Are you so very certain?”

  “If I can’t have your assistance, I’ll have your compliance.” She pressed the muzzle of the TTX pistol to his chest. “Point blank. Not much chance I’ll miss.”

  The manner in which his eyes widened and his hands fell away was quite gratifying. “Fine. I’m listening.”

  “Good.” But she didn’t move the weapon so much as an inch. “You’ve been bitten, albeit lightly, by a woman with fangs. We need to question her.” She paused a moment, let his muddled brain process this statement. “Do you wish to help?”

  “Yes.”

  “Then keep your hands and your mouth and all your other body parts to yourself.” With that, she climbed from the bench. Interrogation called for sturdier garb than thin towels. Quickly, she pulled on a dressing gown, belted it at her waist. Passed Jack the second.

  She crouched before Ceyda, now a crumpled heap of green satin and outrage. The petulant expression on her face did not bode well for a successful interview.